There are some movies that can be encapsulated better in one scene rather than the whole. An example of this is Baz Luhrmann's The Great Gatsby. The best (and perhaps only good) scene in the entire movie is that moment where Gatsby (played to sheer perfection by Leonardo DiCaprio) reunites with Daisy (Carey Mulligan). I think DiCaprio in that moment is everything Gatsby was meant to be -- the excess and the poise of his beautifully expensive suit, squandered by rain even when he chose it and orchestrated it perfectly for Daisy; the expression on his face that's hopeful/wretched/unrequited/desperate as he looks to her...If only that had been the whole movie, I think I would have loved it.

There's a similar scene in The Spectacular Now where Sutter Keely (played by Miles Teller) is having a soft, intimate conversation with Aimee Finecky (played by Shailene Woodley) and the camera ever so slowly draws closer to them. At first, you feel as if the gradual zoom-in is meant to make the relationship more intimate...but then you realize that it represents exactly how claustrophobic Sutter feels in that moment, beset on all sides by expectations imagined and very very real. This was my favorite moment in the whole movie.

The Spectacular Now is an unaffected movie, which is both its strength and weakness. It's a more honest portrayal of high school seniors than anything I ever saw back when I was that age. They're fumbling toward things certain and nebulous at the same time. Sutter and Aimee are uncertain in different ways. Sutter rides on the fumes of an alcoholic bravado, consistently destroying everything he could care about -- not in a bombastic, gaudy way, but in a quiet, muted subsiding that lets it happen. Aimee is quietly naive, loving and supporting for reasons pertaining more to her innocent self-conscious insecurity than any maturity.

If we're taking the title literally, the young actors of this movie are the spectacular now. Woodley, Teller, and Mary Elizabeth Winstead are the bright points of this movie. Director James Ponsoldt handles the acting deftly, playing to all of the facets of these actors without overplaying. The movie is about Sutter, but Woodley's Aimee balances him out, giving an unpretentious, genuinely believable performance. Despite that though, this movie did not make me feel anything, as much as I wanted it to after hearing the rave reviews. The movie as I said, is unaffected, but this also makes it drift along, without a clear point or anchor. At the end of the movie, I was left asking: "so what?". I guess I just wanted something more.